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Original Articles

Segmentation of Tunisian Modal Improvisation: Comparing Listeners' Responses with Computational Predictions

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Pages 117-127 | Published online: 30 Nov 2009
 

Abstract

This study is aimed at an exploration of segmentation strategies through a comparison between listeners' reactions and predictions estimated using computational models. In a listening experiment, Tunisian subjects of various degrees of expertise were asked to listen to a traditional Tunisian improvisation and to indicate in real time the perceived segmentation, first on a global level and, then, on a more detailed level. In parallel, the same piece has been transcribed and analysed by computer, based on heuristics of local discontinuity and parallelism. A detailed analysis of the possible mapping between listeners' responses and models' predictions suggests an explanation of the factors underlying the listeners' understanding of modal improvisation. Most of the segmentation positions proposed by the subjects can be partly explained by the presence of local discontinuities along time and pitch dimensions. Strong local discontinuities relate to listeners' segmentation decisions; weaker discontinuities, on the contrary, cannot explain the perception of segmentation unless they are combined with other factors such as parallelism. Segmentation by Tunisian listeners can be approximated using a model combining local discontinuity and parallelism.

Acknowledgements

This collaboration was initiated in a French project financed by CNRS under the ACI ‘Complex Systems for Human and Social Sciences’, during the years 2003–2005, with Gérard Assayag (Ircam, Paris), Stephen McAdams (McGill University, Montreal) and Petri Toiviainen (University of Jyväskylä). The authors would like to thank Emilios Cambouropoulos and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable advice.

Notes

1For this reason, the other tasks of identification and reduction (cf. Ayari, Citation2008) will not be discussed here.

2Namely, the second author of this article.

3More details concerning the clustering of listeners' reactions are given in the section dealing with the analysis of the segmentation stages in Ayari (Citation2008).

4A first version of the computational analysis was presented in Lartillot and Ayari (Citation2006), but without actual comparison with the listeners' segmentation.

5In the special case of patterns that are sufficiently long and salient to signal segmentation of their own, listeners might decide to indicate a segmentation even when the new occurrence has been detected after some delay. These types of patterns, which do not seem to play a major role in the piece of music studied in this article, should nevertheless be considered in future work.

6An extension of this study (Ayari, Citation2008) shows in particular that segmentation inferred by European musicians offers less consistency, although Jazz musicians seem to be able to grasp major aspects of the phrasal and modal construction of the improvisation. Further experimental data have been collected, in order to test precisely the degree of pertinence of the cognitive schemes used by Tunisian listeners when analysing in real-time modern improvisations based on contemporary styles.

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